


Maps

by botanicalBull



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb/Sgrub Sessions, Character Death, F/F, Humanstuck, Major Character Injury, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-10
Updated: 2016-06-25
Packaged: 2018-06-07 14:14:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6808489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/botanicalBull/pseuds/botanicalBull
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What can one say about Vriska Serket right now that hasn't been said about any famous explorer worth their<br/>salts?  She's young, she's full of ambition, and she's lost. Suddenly, hopelessly lost.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Shot In the Leg By the Starting Gun

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this in the span of a couple hours because i figured the world needs some more fiction with Vriskafic with her not being a massive prick for the sake of itself. My intent is for this to be around 5 chapters, give or take, so I guess enjoy this self indulgent junk as it comes out.

Thursday, August 8 2000  
Sacramento, California, USA 

A small child, Vriska Serket, sits in the bedroom of her family’s high rise apartment near the heart of the capitol. It’s not a particularly special day, or rather, it wasn’t planned out to be, her mother went out to work for the day; that man she sees a lot these days was with her when she went out the door. He was nice, Vriska thought, always polite, played pirates with Vriska whenever she asked him, even if her mother wasn’t especially enthusiastic about him doing it. Her mom says he’s an “activist.” She has no idea what that means; doesn’t really care what it means, but she knows that he’s a good person, just like Mommy. She said he helps her fight bad guys and even sometimes the mean police officers that help the bad guys – she thinks that’s SO cool.

She wonders when her mom’s getting home today; her babysitter’s nice and all, she supposes, but she’d really like for her mom to be there instead of some teenager that looks bored out of her mind all the time. Wonders what’s for dinner; her mom’s not the best cook, but she definitely tries, and she always makes a show of her cooking; and that’s what Vriska appreciates.

It’s five thirty, she’s starting to get more than a bit restless. She asks her babysitter – Damara, she thinks. Friend of mommy’s friend’s son, so Vriska likes her by default almost – if she can play together in Vriska’s room as pirates. She’s met with the usual: her eyes roll, she sighs, she smiles brightly, as though the prior actions had never happened at all, and agrees.

“Sure thing, Vriska,” Damara responds, smile half fake but it appeases Vriska nonetheless.

They play in her room, just like she wanted. Vriska plays the role of “Pir8 Queen” while Damara acts as her First M8. It’s a tired and played out game, but she still finds excitement in it; still finds new challenges and adventures for the Gr8 Captain Mindfang and her loyal first mate to embark upon. She decides today they’ll go raiding a big mean country’s naval base; those darned navy men have had it too good for too long! The mission, as expected of pirates of their stature, is a TOTAL success. They beat the navy, tossed them into pirate prison forever, and got a whole BUNCH of awesome loot! She can’t wait to tell her mom about the adventure she and Damara went on today.  


That is, she couldn’t wait; the excitement was just too great to hold on for a few more hours! She grabs the landline after she helps Damara clean up her room – gotta keep it clean so it’s easier to set up tomorrow – and calls her mother’s cell.

. .  
. . . .  
. . . . . .  
. . . . . . . .  
Mom doesn’t pick up, which is really weird; she always picks up after exactly eight rings. _Always. ___Vriska frowns, hanging up as the phone goes to voicemail, and dials again. She’ll pick up this time for sure, she thinks to herself.  
. .  
. . . .  
. . . . . .  
. . . . . . . .  
Again, nothing. Her heart beats faster now. Mommy’s always picked up when it’s her calling. No matter where or when she was, mommy was always there for her. She goes over to Damara, who she notices is also growing rather worried; she knows Mrs. Serket’s habits just as well as Vriska. Vriska asks her to try calling her mom, which her sitter frantically agrees to.  
. .  
. . . .  
“Hey, this is Mahamari Serket. Leave a message after the beep thingy. “  


It goes to voicemail after barely three rings this time. She hyperventilates, on the verge of tears, wondering if something’s happened. Her babysitter’s panicked state doesn’t help much, but Damara does her best to try to help calm Vriska down until they’re both relatively relaxed. Still nervous, but relaxed. They agree to wait a little bit, just in case her mom calls them back with an explanation.

For another hour, they sit mostly in silence; Damara reads a book she brought along while Vriska halfheartedly plays with her dolls. Another hour drags by in silence; it’s 8 o’clock now. The phone rings, Damara scrambles to pick it up.

“Hello! Miss Serk- “she cuts off suddenly. Vriska can hear somebody - not Mommy - talking on the other end. This doesn’t bode well.

She watches as her babysitter’s face turns from one of hope and excitement to one bordering on despair as the phone call draws out. By the time she hangs up, Damara has an almost eerily blank expression, tears rolling down her cheeks after whatever the person on the line told her. Vriska demands she tell her what happened, saying she can handle whatever it is; she’s basically a six-year-old pirate queen, what can’t she handle right? Damara breaks the news as calmly as she can, voice hitching and breath terribly uneven as she tells her what happened; tells her that her mother was killed that evening. The cops found her stuck in a parking garage downtown with rebar running out of her chest.

Vriska’s a mess of angry, accusatory tears, calling Damara – her loyal first mate, beloved babysitter, and best friend – a liar and a traitor; her mother would never get killed on the job, she’s too strong to die! She keeps arguing that there’s no WAY mom died, but Damara doesn’t bend. Cries, sobs even, but remains rigid in her belief that her mother had died- no, had been murdered in cold blood just a couple hours ago.

She tries – really, really tries – to believe that her mom’s perfectly fine, and that she’ll come home real soon to make some buttery pasta or something and they’ll ALL be happy and laugh about what a GREAT prank that was and they’ll hug and Damara will go home paid because HER MOMMY IS ALIVE AND WELL AND SHE KNOWS IT.

But eventually, she comes to the realization that no, that’s ridiculous; Damara would never, has never lied to her. She’s been cold or aloof, but never dishonest. She knows deep down that her mother won’t be coming back tonight - or if she does Vriska should PROBABLY run; never been much of a fan of zombie movies, this one – and she was a fool for believing otherwise. She climbs into Damara’s lap and she cried, they both cried, their perfectly nice and casual day suddenly stabbed with a serrated spear and had salt poured all over the fresh wound.

Damara doesn’t go home that night; she doesn’t think she can leave Vriska alone like this, especially on a night like this. She calls her mom, explaining what happened in as quick a way as she can – “Something came up mom, I’m sleeping over at miss Serket’s apartment tonight but I’ll be home tomorrow I promise” – and tells Vriska she’ll share the bed with her tonight to keep her company. Vriska doesn’t sleep until early morning and Damara doesn’t sleep at all; too much has happened in so short a time, and they’re both so young. Both though spend hours thinking about who could have done that, and more prominently how they could make them pay for such a horrible thing.

The next day, Damara heads home, totally exhausted, after making Vriska a breakfast of fried eggs and rice. Around noon, a couple hours after Damara leaves, somebody shows up at her door; it’s some big government guys in suits. She knows enough from her mother not to trust those guys - always up to some shady dealings – and employs this knowledge by slamming the door in the face of one of the social workers and hiding in her bedroom, cowering under the covers as she waits for the men to leave her alone. But they don’t leave; they break in. They say they’ve got a warren or something that lets them take her away and bring her somewhere. She doesn’t hear where, nor does she care. She tries for a good ten minutes to try to turn them away, to no avail.

She does manage, however, to get them to let her keep her mother’s old sword: a tempered steel cutlass with a cobalt blue handle and a gold plated wrist guard, her mother's name engraved in Hindi along the blade; one of the few things her mother truly treasured, and they let her keep it. She takes her mother’s- _her_ sword, and her stuffed spider her mom won at a carnival last year, and finally agrees to go with the government men, ever wary as she leaves behind her home, bound for the police department where she's sure they'll got this whole mess sorted out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Pack up  
> Don't stray  
> Oh say say say  
> Oh say say say. . ."
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIIxlgcuQRU


	2. Zero

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s barely over a month since that night her mom died now, but to young Vriska, it feels like years. She had to come out to San Jose a couple days ago; her mom wanted a burial at sea, and who are she and the government to take that wish from her?

Sunday, September 10 2000  
San Jose, California, USA

It’s barely over a month since that night her mom died now, but to young Vriska, it feels like years. She had to come out to San Jose a couple days ago; her mom wanted a burial at sea, and who are she and the government to take that wish from her? She hasn’t seen Damara ever since. The police won’t tell her what happened to her, no matter how much she begs. That man she used to see with mom hasn’t shown up in a while either; the cops say he came by her apartment one day a few weeks ago to pick up some belongings of his, but he hasn’t been seen since then by anybody. 

She wishes she could be with one of them right now; that she didn’t have to come all the way out to the darned BAY to throw her own mother into the ocean. She hopes Damara and Mommy’s friend are alright. She doesn’t think she can handle losing another loved one so soon after her mom. She knows her mother’s not coming back, but by god she is gonna hope SO hard that her best friend doesn’t have to leave her too. 

Around half past noon, the G-Men take her and a couple women she met over the last few days, Rosa and Aranea, an old friend of Mom’s and Vriska’s half-sister respectively, and drove them out to the pier in San Francisco. She tried to make conversation with Aranea, since she was apparently her sister, but she seemed… off. To Vriska. Rosa, however, was far more open to conversation, practically radiating warmth, despite the circumstances that brought them together.

There’s a small crew waiting on the pier for them in mom’s old boat, “The Co8alt Corsair” as it says in gleaming cerulean on the hull. Rosa helps her out of the car onto the dock with Aranea close behind, holding carefully in her hands the urn containing their mother’s ashes. She leads them onto the boat and they get a few minute’s time to just sit in silence before they weigh anchor and the Corsair makes its final voyage out to open waters, followed by a couple speedboats. 

The service is short; no one really says anything for parting words, save for Rosa and Vriska herself. Rosa says some being quite close to Mahamari, however long ago, and remarks on how much slower paced life is bound to feel with her gone. Vriska rambles teary-eyed about how up until just a few weeks ago she would always look forward to her mother coming home with some new story from work, and Vriska in turn would tell her all about what she and her friend Damara did that day. Aranea remains silent, looking almost as though she couldn’t care any less about the service. Vriska assumes it’s just because she wasn’t too close to their mom before, but it still causes her unrest. 

When everybody’s said their peace, Aranea, of all people, does the honors of casting the ashes out to sea, and they allow miss Rosa to keep the urn, for sentimental purposes. With all that taken care of, they load off of the yacht and onto the speedboats, driving the boats out a quarter mile from the ship before stopping. It is then, and only then, that explosions are seen from the lower end of the hull, tossing water this way and that as it deals the blow to sink the Co8alt Corsair, and with it the last of Mahamari Serket’s material belongings. 

They rush back to the pier in silence; the mood suddenly too somber for even kind miss Rosa’s indulgence of Vriska’s chattering. When they reach the pier, however, Rosa slips Vriska a piece of paper, her telephone number written on it in glittery green ink, telling her to call her if she ever needed support. They part ways soon after; Vriska goes back to Sacramento, Rosa to Los Angeles, Aranea to the airport to head to the East Coast. 

\- - - - - - - -

She’s been back home for a few days now. Well, not HOME home, - she’s in some foster home across town from her REAL home - but at least she’s back in Sacramento. The family she’s staying with is nice enough, she thinks, but they’re awfully boring; they keep insisting Vriska play regular fairy princesses with their daughter instead of pirates, to which Vriska is quite adamant about never ever EVER doing unless she gets to be a pirate princess. 

They do, however, let her watch TV. It’s just local news and nature documentaries, but it’s something. Vriska decides to watch the news, she thinks it’ll help her to know about whatever’s going on around town. It does help, in a sense, but not at all in the way she’d expected. She learns a few new things that afternoon. The first, and most important to her, being that Damara is alive, but bound for prison for attempted murder; reports say she turned herself in after brutally assaulting Rufioh Nitram - for both his relation to her former employer’s killer and his alleged cheating in their relationship - leaving him paralyzed from from neck down. The second thing she learned was the identity, including the face and name, of said murderer: Sebastian Nitram, the very same man she saw come and go so often with her mother. That was the news that struck her hardest. The third, final, and most strangely satisfying of the news reports, was that Sebastian Nitram, her mother’s killer, was _also ___found dead just yesterday in his cell in the nearby prison, head crushed and beaten almost beyond recognition by what reports describe as a "crazed, self-righteous cellmate."

Her foster family comes in right near the end of that last report, scrambling to shut it off and “spare Vriska the horrible happenings of life,” but she’s seen what she needed to; she’s got at least some closure now, and that’s a step up from the big load of nothing the past month has yielded. She spends the rest of the day in the guest room, lying in bed with Spinneret: The Stuffed Spider, as she thought about what she saw on the news that afternoon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "You're zero  
> What's your name?  
> No one's going to ask you  
> Better find out where they want you to go"
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmGNo8RL5kM


	3. The End Of Something Once So Excellent

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaaaa this took far longer than I'd originally planned, but it's finally up. I think we can all agree that depression and dysphoria are super lame. That said, enjoy this newer, more lighthearted chapter!

Sunday, October 28, 2001

Sacramento, California

Vriska Serket wakes up today to feeling no different than usual, save for the knowledge that she is now a whole officially an entire year older. And her EIGHTH birthday, no less! Truly exciting stuff for the young lady. Granted she is well aware of how little it matters since it’s really only an extra day upon the thousands behind her, she’s still quite excited to be coming up on the first year of her life divisible (“divisible”: that’s a new math word she learned this past year at school, she’s quite proud of her knowledge of it) by her favorite number. 

Though it may be true that even after nine months spent living in the Sacramento Children’s Home feeling no closer to anybody than when she first arrived, she has spent a good portion of her time so far learning from what public records of her mother she could get her hands on; odd that she feels closer to mom after her passing, but she’ll take her victories where she can get them. 

The past couple months were a rather rough ride for most, most everyone Vriska knew was worried there’d be some second horrible attack to rival 9/11. She knew better than to worry about it though; Sacramento as a whole is hardly as high profile as the World Trade Center was on its own; even given its status as capital of California, no one in their right mind would target them out of most other major cities. And as for those others? She hardly cared. She knew no one outside of this old town, and she is quite determined to hold onto what she's got now as best she can.

Learning about her mom’s old work has given her some new perspective on things, like for instance her knowledge on how criminals, or terrorists in the case of the previous statement, would work. That said, her ability to learn and recognize patterns has increased significantly in the time since she was admitted to the orphanage; if she’d applied these abilities to her school rather than reading up on her mom’s criminal records, people would certainly recognize her for how bright a child she was, and less for her odd obsessions. 

But alas, this is not the case, and she shows little signs of changing this behavior, but I digress. She goes about her day as one who’s lived with her for months has come to expect she would on her birthday: brazenly flaunting herself about, providing other children and the occasional grown-up with ‘casual’ reminders of the importance of the day. 

Much to her chagrin, she earns more than a few time outs that morning for her “indiscretions,” though she’s quite determined not to let an hour or two of time spent in a corner in silence ruin her big day! Once she’s out of that corner in the recreation room, however, she seems to have learned her lesson. 

Which is to say, she knows now that she needs to be subtle with her (self-)righteous birthday bragging, that way she can spread the good word, _and_ avoid getting in trouble. She’s quite proud of herself for this innovative idea of hers. 

Luckily for her, she appears to really have gotten this whole “subtle bragging” thing down rather quickly; she’s not been pulled aside by one of the grown-ups around here in like, ninety whole minutes. 

Sweet. 

Once she’s _pretty_ sure she’s told every orphan and caretaker in the building of the significance of this day, she heads up to her bed, grabbing up her wallet full of money she “earned” over the last year - courtesy of several of the other residents of the orphanage – and goes for a walk with a trusted adult to buy a well-earned birthday gift for herself. Honestly, though, she’s pretty sure she can handle herself, but those gosh-darned grown-ups insist someone go with her when she goes out. Curse those grown-ups. Curse. Them. All. 

She decides she’s first going to head to the liquor store down the street and pick up some candies. She ends up buying herself about eight blow pops and a little box of tamarind straw candies, all of which she plans to eat when she gets back home later. 

“That’s an awful lot of candy there, Vriska, I hope you plan to share. I know it’s your birthday, but you’re gonna get one nasty tummy ache if you have all that yourself in one go.” 

Darn it. Honestly, this guy’s timing is so lame. Plus, Vriska is quite clearly _way_ too cool for dumb baby stuff like tummy aches. She is eight years old darn it.

Still though, this guy probably wasn’t going to ease off if she went and told him off with something like that last paragraph. 

“I know!” she begins, honestly for now. “S’okay, I’ll share. Stomach aches are super dumb.” 

Her chaperone pauses for a moment, thinking, then replies with “Aren’t they though? But yeah, I’m sure the other kids will appreciate you sharing with them.” 

He seems to have bought it. Good. She was a little scared he wouldn’t believe her, so she lets out a little sigh of relief which, frankly, should have given her away, but the man watching over her doesn’t seem to have noticed or, if he did, is paying it little to no attention. 

Her second, and final, stop for her Birthday Shopping Spree happens to be the only toy store she knows the address of by heart thanks to having gone there as many times as she had a year and a half prior; say what you will about her mother, that woman definitely knew how to care for, or at least spoil, her daughter. 

She doesn’t have much left in the way of birthday funding after that little trip to the liquor store, so her choices are pretty limited. That is, until her _oh so generous_ chaperone decides to give her ten dollars, since “it is [her] birthday, after all,” and that “[she] should be able to get something nice.” 

Vriska, in her eight-year-old benevolence and wisdom, decides that this guy isn’t actually a total pooper, beaming as she “graciously” accepts the birthday money with an excited hug. She almost feels bad about lying to him about wanting to share her candies. 

Almost. 

Sorry, Greg. Nothing personal. 

She ends up buying a red Bionicle figure for herself. She’s pretty sure it’s gonna take her at least half an hour to put it together, with those little hands of hers, but she’s also even MORE sure that it’s totally going to be worth it. I mean, do any of those other kids back home have something as absolutely radical as a bright red Bionicle? No? Of course they don’t, they’re probably not smart enough to have thought to get something that cool, unlike Vriska herself. 

When she finally gets back to the orphanage, she runs straight up to her room, trying and mostly succeeding to ignore the calls of Chaperone Greg in her haste to tuck into her delicious candies and build her new Lego toy. 

Unfortunately this, paired with her promise from earlier (see “S’okay, I’ll share!”), lands her in a big old heap of troublesome garbage as, not one minute into her arriving in her room and dumping the unopened candy and toy onto her bed, Greg (that jerk, she trusted him!) walks in with about four curious little kids in tow. 

APPARENTLY, he’d told them of her willingness to share her birthday candies, which she’d ALSO apparently have known, had she just stopped for a few seconds to heed his calls in her earlier haste. She handles this betrayal about as graciously as most eight-year-olds are capable: by yelling and crying for about a minute straight until FINALLY Greg gives in with a compromise. 

She still ends up losing four of her blow pops to those little jerks, but it’s better than losing them all over a tantrum she supposes. Luckily, those suckers are too chicken to handle the awesomeness of the tamarind candy’s flavor, so she keeps that all to herself when they finally leave her alone to her remaining lollipops and yet unopened Bionicle. 

The rest of the day passes without much incident. The new toy gives her usually scattered thoughts something to focus in on for the next few hours, and the candies eventually give her a stomach ache, just like she’d been told. Still though, she says it was totally worth it. She’s absolutely certain that this year was a far cry from the isolation and disappointment that was her last birthday. She won’t dwell on it though. No point, right? She’s eight now, she’s a big girl. Big girls don’t cry over anything. Besides, she’s okay now. 

She’s gonna be okay now. She knows so. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Your ship may be coming in  
> You're weak but not giving in  
> To the cries and the wails of the valley below  
> Your ship may be coming in  
> You're weak but not giving in  
> And you'll fight it you'll go out fighting all of them..."  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0sy7y54XAE


End file.
